Emmanuel Levinas, a Lithuanian Jewish philosopher whose adoptive
homeland was France, formed a critique of the philosophical
tradition of the West for its suppression of alterity and
proclaimed the priority of ethics over ontology. He was also active
throughout his life in the Jewish community, and produced a rich
body of work arising out of this commitment.

Levinas was born in Kovno (Kaunas), Lithuania, on December
30th, 1905, by the Julian calendar used in the Russian
empire at the time – January 12, 1906 by our calendar. However it
is December 30th that he always considered to be his
birthday. He was immersed from an early age both in Torah and in
the greatest Russian writers. His boyhood was marked b…

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